State Keeps Archaeological Sites Secret To Prevent Damage, Looting

As far back as 5,000 years ago, people camped in two villages along the St. Johns River in an area now known as east Lake County.

They dined on snails and other fresh water shellfish they could reap from the river. They called the area home for about 1,000 years.

Both places - Bowers Bluff and Kimball Island - are archaeological sites so important to Florida's history that they are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

But you won't find any markers or plaques commemorating the sites. You would have a tough time finding them - that is, unless you travel to Tallahassee to peruse state records.

Florida's history buffs and archaeologists want to keep it that way.

''It's our general policy to keep these locations confidential,'' said Barbara Mattick, a historic sites specialist with the state Bureau of Historic Preservation in Tallahassee.

''There's such a potential for looting and damage to the sites,'' Mattick said. ''People like to tear them up, always hoping that there is some gold or pottery to be found there.''

Florida's policy to keep the location of such sites under wraps is in line with a recent federal move to remove some archaeological sites and other historic places of interest from maps because of problems with looting.

Under federal law, government officials may keep secret the location of a historic ruin. The hope is that people will pass them by, or be forced to register with those supervising the ruins before visiting.

''It's hard to say whether removing that information from public documents helps, but it's one of the few things archaeologists can do to try to stem the tides of destruction,'' said Jim Miller, chief archaeologist with the state historic preservation office.

Florida has 15,000 archaeological sites; 86 of them are listed in the national register, said Robin Jackson of the state historic preservation office.

The national register is an official list of sites and properties throughout the country that reflect the historic development of local communities, states and the nation.

Not much is known about the people who lived in Bowers Bluff and Kimball Island.

State historians call them aborigines, a term used to describe the first or earliest inhabitants of a region.

Like their modern-day counterparts, the aborigines loved shellfish. In fact, their penchant for snails and other freshwater shellfish forced them to eventually leave Bowers Bluff and Kimball Island.

''The river had shifted course, and they couldn't get snails anymore,'' Mattick said. ''But snails are what they liked to eat most, so they had to leave to find them.''

State historians didn't have to conduct elaborate tests to find out what the aborigines ate. Instead, they sifted through garbage.

That's right, garbage. The historic sites at Bowers Bluff and Kimball Island are classified as middens - a fancy word for refuse dumps.

''You can learn a lot from what people throw away,'' Mattick said. ''Their trash shows you what they ate, and whether they used pottery and ceramics'' which helps determine how old the sites are, she said.

Neither Lake County site is a burial mound, which attract the most vandals.

''That's where the goodies are, like gold and pottery, because they were buried with the people,'' Mattick said.

Most burial mounds have been destroyed, Miller said.

It's important to protect archaeological sites because later they may yield important insights into a region's past.

''New scientific techniques and new theories come up all of the time,'' Mattick said. ''But if the site is destroyed, we've lost forever that precious information we have gained from it, and could have gained later.''

However, archaeological sites are hard to protect because they are so isolated, Miller said.

''Many, many of these sites are remote, in deep woods or along the coast, and require special vehicles and boats to get there,'' Miller said.

State historic preservation officials won't disclose the exact locations of archaeological sites. The only way to get that information is to thumb through the state's master file of historic sites in Tallahassee.

''Unfortunately, people can look it up,'' Mattick said. ''We just take our chances.''

While fines can be imposed on people who disturb such sites - digging up human remains is a third-degree felony in Florida - it's tough to catch vandals.

''People who destroy archaeological sites usually don't get caught, and don't tell you how they learned about the sites,'' Miller said. ''It's extremely unusual for an archaeologist, in the course of a decade, to find a site that has not been destroyed in some way.

''Somebody probably is trying to dig into a historic mound right now.''